The present invention relates to a hidden pattern in holographic magnetic (HoloMag™) tape for protection against skimming, alteration and counterfeiting of the data encoded in the holographic magnetic tape.
HoloMag tape is an embossed diffraction grating hologram on top of a magnetic oxide tape that provides visual identification features to the tape and to whatever product the HoloMag tape is applied. Typically HoloMag tape is applied to plastic cards to provide visual identification to the card as well as standard magnetic encoding capabilities to the HoloMag tape on the card. When the plastic card is a financial card (credit or debit card) the HoloMag mag stripe on the card must meet industry magnetic and encoding standards as well as design holographic image standards provided by the customer. The HoloMag tape has been designed to meet all of these standards and industry/customer requirements.
However, in order to further improve the security of these HoloMag tapes, a hidden image pattern, such as hidden image bar code pattern, has been incorporated into HoloMag tapes.